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To think she was already receiving praise and recognition from world-renowned musicians at such a young age. It felt as if music were an innate instinct—something embodied within her, rather than the result of time and effort. The thought that only someone of that caliber truly deserved sponsorship weighed heavily on Hee-jin.
“What are you thinking about?”
Seok-hyun approached Hee-jin, who had been tucked away in a corner lost in thought since meeting the genius girl, and handed her a glass of wine. Hee-jin thanked him obediently and brought the glass to her lips. The bitter yet rich taste seemed to perfectly represent her current mood.
“Just... wondering what I was doing at that age.”
At Hee-jin's words, Seok-hyun glanced around. He nodded upon seeing the girl surrounded by adults not far away. While she possessed outstanding musicality and skill, that alone wasn't enough to capture his interest. Seok-hyun didn't feel particularly intrigued by beings who were already "complete" from the start.
“It's obvious. You were probably practicing like crazy, abusing your fingers.”
Hee-jin shot him a sidelong glance, feeling the sting of the phrase "abusing your fingers," before looking forward again. That child was already standing on the world stage and basking in the spotlight at a young age, while she had merely been learning the violin at a neighborhood academy during those years.
She had even attended a regular school, practicing on a factory-made violin her father had bought for her at an instrument shop in Jongno. Of course, that violin was nowhere to be found now. Because Go Seok-hyun had smashed it.
“…….”
Her thoughts drifting back to the music camp, Hee-jin turned to Seok-hyun and asked softly.
“Come to think of it, I don't think I've asked you this, but... do you regret smashing my violin that day?”
Seok-hyun looked at her for a moment and then gave a nonchalant smile. He simply smiled quietly, as if he had no intention of answering. However, facing that smile, Hee-jin felt that he still didn't regret it. Even after sharing their bodies, confessing their family histories, and forming such a deep intimacy, nothing had changed.
“To that man, other people's lives must be like pieces on a game board. He has nothing to lose even if he loses them.”
Andy's words flashed painfully through her mind.
“To use someone's desperation to place them on a game board... he's truly malicious.”
A bitter smile played on Hee-jin's lips. Her mouth felt indescribably bitter, as if the wine she had just drunk wasn't even the bitterest thing in the room.
“Well. Since I got to practice with a better violin thanks to you smashing it, I suppose I'm actually indebted to you, right?”
Hiding her true feelings, she intentionally said something he would likely agree with, and the response was exactly as expected.
“Exactly. If things had gone according to my plan, you wouldn't have even needed to study abroad.”
A hint of regret appeared on Seok-hyun's face. Hee-jin didn't even want to know what he had been thinking.
What on earth was he expecting?
If he was a man who didn't even know how to reflect after committing a wrong, there was no telling what else he might do under the pretext of placing her on the world's top stage. The perfect studio had been a sweet trap designed to make her fall into Go Seok-hyun's hands. Realizing she had been blinded by it, failing to see the truth and almost falling into danger, Hee-jin bit her lip hard.
“…Still, it was a very important violin to me.”
As she poured out her heart as a final act of desperation, Seok-hyun's smile deepened.
“I understand. You must have been attached to it.”
Just as her expression began to soften, thinking he was empathizing with her pain, he continued.
“Still, a cheap violin like that didn't suit you, Noona.”
Hee-jin's lips, which had just begun to part, closed heavily.
✾ ✾ ✾
“What is the violin to me….”
Hee-jin murmured softly. As a child, the violin was nothing more than a means to attract her parents' attention. After going abroad, it took on another meaning. It was a refuge to escape a strange reality and the sole support for the young Yoo Hee-jin, who had nothing else to cling to.
She had to be good. Because the sound the violin made was ultimately a cry for someone to please look at her. It was like a pitiful scream, begging for someone to please love her.
Hee-jin tried hard to recall a time even earlier than that, when she had simply loved the violin purely. However, it had been too long to remember what emotions she had held toward the instrument. She might remember more if she could dig out the old videotapes buried in the cabinets of her house in America, but there was no way to watch them right now.
The more she wandered through her hazy memories, the more foreign she felt to herself, so Hee-jin searched for recent videos she had saved in the cloud. They were mostly videos from her college days, around the time she was active in a club and an ensemble team.
In the videos she hadn't seen in a long time, there was a version of herself she didn't remember. The girl performing chamber music with friends in a hospital lobby surprisingly had a face full of vitality.
'Did I actually make a face like that...?'
The version of herself on the screen looked as if she were "dying of happiness." She even joked around, having an impromptu playing battle with a friend. The cheerful sound of her laughter stimulated her hearing in an unfamiliar way.
The Yoo Hee-jin of that time was living each day happily in a world where countless possibilities were open. Winning a world-class competition was a feasible dream, something that felt within reach if she just stretched out her hand. But that dream wasn't necessarily a goal she had to achieve. It was simply a desire to fully showcase her skills on stage, not an obsession that she must win.
There was no one she had to impress; it was a time when she worked hard simply because she wanted to be good.
As Hee-jin went through the videos one by one, memories she had long forgotten began to bloom. The moments she visited community centers or nursing homes with her ensemble team to give talent-donation performances became as vivid as if they had happened yesterday. She wondered how she could have lived while completely forgetting how happy she had been.
Suddenly curious about how her club members were doing, she looked them up on social media. Most of them had joined orchestras like her, but a few friends were walking entirely different paths. One friend had started a YouTube channel, filming themselves playing the violin while visiting remote areas around the world, and was quite popular.
Seeing that, the words she heard at the sponsorship event came back to her. The words that the stage isn't necessarily limited to a concert hall.
Success didn't only mean reaching the top and going on a world tour. There were many forms of stages, and true success meant finding a stage of one's own. Just as she had been happy performing in a hospital lobby or a shopping mall atrium before.
She suddenly remembered playing at Navy Pier. She could almost feel the cool breeze blowing from the lakeside. She suddenly missed the person she was back then. While one side of her heart felt warm and fuzzy, she finally began to face reality.
“That's right…. Back then, I was happy just playing the violin.”
Hee-jin realized that when she joined the orchestra, she had felt, somewhere in her heart, that she had 'failed.' She had drawn a limit for herself and collapsed, concluding that she could not move beyond it. Because of that, her vision had narrowed, and she believed that sponsorship was the only way to pull herself up. If only she received sponsorship, she could stand on stage as a soloist, she could showcase wonderful performances...
Since she had been possessed by such thoughts, how sweet must Go Seok-hyun's offer to make her the best in the world have sounded?
Realizing she had walked into the trap of her own accord, Hee-jin bit her lip firmly. Come to think of it, Go Seok-hyun had never once deceived her with a false persona. She had simply seen what she wanted to see and thought what she wanted to think, blinded by greed.
Hee-jin closed her eyes and took a slow, deep breath. After a long while, when she opened her eyes again, a firm determination was set in her heart. Everything was now clear.
“Yes, let's go back to where I belong.”
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